Carson: Gov't should play facilitating role in health care

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Carson: Gov't should play facilitating role in health care

HUD secretary says government should not play a predominant role in health care, urges Democrats to get involved

This is a rush transcript from "Your World," June 27, 2017. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

NEIL CAVUTO, HOST: All right, you're looking at a live shot of the White House right now, where we have at least a little bit more than 40 U.S. Republican senators gathering with the president of the United States, who is making a pitch to them. We have to get this done.

Now, what he is referring to is the health care effort that would follow on the work of the House, even though it is a completely different package, depending on your point of view, one that kind it does the same sort of thing. It's a leaner, meaner version of ObamaCare.

Now, Senator Rand Paul has said that it really doesn't fit the bill. It's really more like ObamaCare-lite. He's been particularly critical of measures in there that could potentially just swap one big government program with just another big government program.

And he wants assurances that whatever effort the Senate finally does come up with to rein in the growth of Medicare, to rein in the growth of some of these guarantees we make, and then to sort of see where this can go.

The president, of course, has earlier been saying he thinks that you will never get anything perfect, but this is close as you get to getting the ball rolling in that direction. And he is confident he will have the votes to do that.

Not all 52 Republican senators are there. We are told again, a little bit more than 40. We hope to be able to get -- effort some tape from this meeting going on now.

Pam, is that ready, or no?

All right, in the meantime, I can tell you that I did raise this issue earlier on with HUD Secretary Ben Carson. You might be saying, well, Neil, the HUD secretary, what does have to do with this? Well, of course, he is a neurosurgeon by training. He's also been very big at talking about dealing with these kinds of issues and finding a bridge that can connect both Democrats and Republicans on this issue in particular.

This is earlier today, Ben Carson with me on FOX Business Network. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CAVUTO: Do you think the government should still have a role, though, in health care? Because a lot of conservative critics of the Senate plan, that you still have the government, albeit on a slightly less basis, controlling health care?

How do you feel about that?

BEN CARSON, HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT SECRETARY: Well, the government is supposed to facilitate life. And that has to do with health care.

The pursuit of happiness, liberty, I think all of those are important things. So, there is a role, but it's not a predominant role. It's a facilitating role.

And I think the senators, as they look at this, they will come to recognize that this is much more facilitative of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness than what we had before.

CAVUTO: Much more? Because a lot of people say, maybe a little more, but maybe not much more.

CARSON: No, it's a lot more.

And it's also not the final script. This is a very, very good start. A lot of things have been looked at. And I think it's going to be tweaked. I would invite the Democrats to get involved in helping to tweak it too.

This is something for all of us. We need to get out of this idea of scoring political points, and think about what the responsibility is of the representatives of the people.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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